Skilled Immigrants Research Articles

How Do Immigration Policies Affect Voter Support for Low-Skilled Immigrants? Evidence from a Survey Experiment

Countries depend on both high- and low-skilled immigration to meet economic needs. But most voters prefer high-skilled immigrants, despite the fact that multiple economic sectors structurally depend on low-skilled immigrants. In this paper, we examine voter preferences toward low-skilled immigrants as one barrier to effective immigration policy, even in political regimes where immigration is the consequence of highly coordinated or “planned” policies. Specifically, we consider whether government communication around the benefits of low-skilled immigration can increase favorability of such policies. We are particularly interested in the ways in which government communicates immigration messages and whether the scope or concentration of the proposed benefits will move individual preferences. In an online survey experiment, we present Canadians ( N=2,023) with a policy brief that manipulates immigrant skill level (high vs. low), economic outcomes of migration (positive vs. mixed), and the geographic scope of benefits (concentrated vs. sociotropic). Employing two measures of policy support, we find some evidence that positive framing can increase overall support for low-skill migrants. We also find that manipulating framing around high-skilled workers has little effect on support for low-skill workers, even when that framing presents countervailing evidence as to the benefit of high-skilled labor. In sum, our findings suggest that elite level communication around the benefits of low-skill labor may have the ability to disrupt longstanding antipathy for low-skilled labor, even in regimes with longstanding support for high-skilled labor.

Media Exposure to Highly Skilled Immigrants and Attitudes Toward Immigration

AbstractCan exposure to successful immigrants in the mass media affect perceptions of immigrants and alter attitudes toward immigration? To address this question, I study the case of Ozlem Tureci and Ugur Sahin, the co-developers of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, and children of Turkish immigrants in Germany. I first demonstrate that German media favorably highlighted the Turkish roots and migration history of vaccine developers. Leveraging the quasi-experimental setting with the announcement of the success of the vaccine, I then posit that the wide broadcasting of the vaccine’s success and its developers’ identity should have positive spillover effects on public attitudes towards immigration. Amongst those who were exposed to this announcement, compared to those who were not, there is a 4 percentage-point increase in support of easing immigration opportunities. I suggest that this effect is driven by a change in perceptions and knowledge on issues relating to immigration and integration. These findings imply that promoting successful immigrants in the media has the potential to diminish prejudice; however, it is crucial to address varying biases toward different immigrant groups.

A comparative view of the South African and Canadian framework for issuing work visas to skilled refugees and asylum seekers

South Africa faces a shortage of skilled workers due to long-standing systemic challenges that prevent it from producing the skills necessary for economic development. In 2021, only 25 per cent of persons employed in South Africa were considered highly skilled. The critical skills work visa has been designed to facilitate the employment of skilled immigrants, but is unsuitable for doing so in the case of skilled asylum seekers and refugees, even though the latter could alleviate the shortage of skilled workers. While members of this group are eligible to apply for a critical skills work visa, they face significant obstacles that hinder their chances of obtaining one. This article highlights the barriers this group encounters and draws lessons from Canada's Economic Mobility Pathways Project, which has successfully connected skilled refugees to employers and filled in-demand positions. In South Africa, the likelihood of obtaining a critical skills work visa without governmental intervention is low for many in this group, resulting in a waste of their skills. The article compares the South African case to how Canada has integrated skilled refugees to occupations requiring skills. Canada's partnerships with NPOs such as Talent Beyond Borders have been vital in assisting skilled refugees and connecting them to employers. The article thus argues that to employ skilled refugees in positions commensurate with their skills, the South African government has to assist and form partnerships with organisations specialising in this cause.

Does Employing Skilled Immigrants Enhance Competitive Performance? Evidence from European Football Clubs

We investigate the effect of employing skilled immigrants on the competitive performance of organizations by studying European football (soccer) clubs in Germany, Italy, France, England, and Spain from 1990 to 2020. Microdata from this setting offers unusual transparency about players’ birthplaces and their contributions to organizational performance. Further, country-level rules govern how many immigrant players clubs can deploy. Using changes to these rules as the basis for instrumental variables, we find that the number of immigrant players in the club’s starting lineup has a positive local average treatment effect on the club’s performance. We show that this occurs for two related reasons. First, immigrants exhibit higher individual talent. Second, immigrants play a coordinating role that enables the organization to broaden the variety of on-field strategies and actions it uses to outperform rivals. The latter mechanism is novel to the literature. This paper was accepted by Olav Sorenson, organizations. Funding: F. Morales acknowledges research funding from Agencia Nacional de Investigación y Desarrollo, Chile (Fondecyt de Iniciación) [Grant 11200342]. Supplemental Material: The online appendix and data files are available at https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2021.03356 .

The role of migration-innovation nexus for population aging

AbstractImmigration can potentially address demographic challenges in developed countries by introducing young workers into the labor markets but, at the same time, it can increase competition for jobs with socio-economic effects that need to be carefully managed. Prior research has focused on the impact of immigration on local labor markets taking into account the skills of native-born inhabitants and immigrants. In contrast, analyses of age-specific effects are scarce despite the fact that immigration is likely to affect workers in different age-cohorts to different extents, with various policy implications. In addition, firms’ innovative capacity may contribute to shaping the effects of immigration. This work contributes to the existing literature by examining the relationships between immigration, labor market dynamics, and innovation in Western Europe between 2011 and 2019. The analysis uses microdata drawn from the Labour Force Surveys, from the OECD REGPAT database, and from the European Social Survey. The results show that immigrants are more likely to substitute younger native workers, while adult workers benefit from immigrants employed in complementary tasks. This substitution/complementarity nexus increases in the more innovative sectors. From a policy standpoint, these findings highlight the need for age-specific policies and training programs in order to mitigate the adverse effects of immigration and to maximize growth-promotion.

Professional learning and knowledge ‘transfer’ in practice: Immigrant engineers reticulating the epistemic culture of the profession

It is known that skilled immigrants learn to integrate professionally. This paper complexifies this image. By following the experiences of ‘successful’ immigrants working in the engineering profession in Canada, it argues that immigrants engage in not only learning but also knowledge ‘transfer’. Their learning at work often starts as legitimate peripheral participation, and evolves through expansive participation in work activities. Meanwhile, they also ‘transfer’ knowledge and practices, a role that could be amplified given their transnational experiences. Immigrants’ learning and knowledge practices can also be understood as a sociomaterial process of translation, through which they knot together people and objects, while negotating power, position, and positionality at the same time. Through continuous learning and knowledge practices, the paper further highlights that immigrant engineers necessarily articulate themselves into, and to some extent, reticulate the epistemic ‘machineries’ or ‘culture’ of the profession, which is constituted through a nexus of professional associations, societies, institutions, and practice communities that are bounded by professional domains and interests, and lifeworld exigencies. Conceptually, this paper draws on practice-based theories and views continuous learning and knowing as an effect of the sociocultural and sociomaterial organization of professional practices.

Here for good? The unique nature of public attitudes toward highly skilled immigrants in Hong Kong

ABSTRACT Most studies on immigration attitudes assume that natives overwhelmingly welcome highly skilled immigrants. I argue that this assumption, which commonly focuses on the economic benefits of immigrants’ skills, is problematic for two reasons. First, it neglects the incentives and conditions that countries need to offer to win talent. Second, natives prioritize different moral principles when evaluating high– and low-skilled immigrants. Based on 54 in-depth interviews conducted in Hong Kong, supplemented by an original online survey (N = 1,432), I show that public support for highly skilled immigrants is heavily driven by concerns about loyalty and equality. Specifically, natives reject highly skilled immigrants when they perceive them as opportunists who take advantage of the host economy or who stay only briefly. These perceptions are shaped by trust, preferences for equality, and, at the macro level, immigration policies. My findings underscore the need for greater attention to the distinct nature of public opinion about highly skilled immigration and, as the competition for global talent intensifies, to the public backlash against it.

Remittance as reactive transnationalism: The role of perceived unfairness among immigrants in South Korea

AbstractDespite numerous studies on the economic transnational connections of immigrants, focusing mainly on remittances to their home countries, the remittance behaviours and related factors of immigrants in South Korea, a country experiencing increased racial and ethnic diversity, remain relatively understudied. Applying a resource‐dependent and reactive transnationalism framework, this study examines the associations between assimilation, human capital, and immigrants' remittance behaviours. Additionally, we investigate whether perceived unfairness moderates these relationships, reflecting reactive transnationalism. Utilizing data from a 2021 Survey on Immigrants' Living Conditions and Labor Force (N = 7981), we delve into various remitting behaviours, including remittance frequency, the share of monthly remittances in expenditures, and the total remittance amount. The independent variables include assimilation indicators (length of stay in Korea and intention to remain), human capital factors (education and income) and perceived unfairness in the workplace. Ordinary least squares and logistic regression analyses were conducted to examine these relationships. Our findings support both linear and resource‐dependent transnationalism: assimilation and human capital levels are associated with immigrants' remittance behaviours. However, the interaction between perceived unfairness and reactive transnationalism was observed specifically for human capital, indicating that immigrants with higher human capital are more responsive to unfairness and discrimination. As a result, they may want to increase their self‐esteem by sending money back to their home country. This study not only contributes to understanding immigrant remittance behaviours in South Korea but also highlights the conceptual significance of examining remittance behaviours through reactive transnationalism, particularly the critical role of perceived unfairness among highly skilled immigrants.

HOW AI CAN REDUCE UNEMPLOYMENT RATE AMONG VULNERABLE POPULATION OF NEW IMMIGRANTS: ASSIMILATION ISSUES RESOLVED WITH AI

The relevance of this study is to examine the role of artificial intelligence (AI) in the assimilation of vulnerable immigrant groups, in particular, in facilitating their integration into labour markets of new countries and reducing unemployment. The purpose of the article is to identify opportunities and mechanisms for using AI to support immigrants' adaptation, as well as to analyse policies and programmes aimed at attracting and developing immigrant talent in the field of AI. The study uses general scientific methods of analysis, synthesis, comparison and generalisation to evaluate available information, statistics and practical examples. The results of the study demonstrate that artificial intelligence has significant potential to support the assimilation of vulnerable categories of immigrants, facilitate their integration into new socio-economic conditions and reduce unemployment among them. Through the use of innovative AI tools and technologies, immigrants can access personalised educational resources, labour market information, and cultural nuances, which will greatly facilitate their adaptation. An analysis of the impact of AI on immigrant assimilation has shown the effectiveness of online courses, mentoring programmes, and specialised training modules in providing the necessary knowledge and skills to successfully enter the labour market of a new country. In particular, advanced training and retraining programmes available through AI platforms have proven to be highly effective in providing immigrants with relevant competencies and facilitating their professional development. Particular attention was paid to the US policy aimed at attracting and supporting skilled immigrants in the field of AI. The paper shows that the active use of AI in the process of immigrants' adaptation facilitates their rapid integration into the new society and plays a crucial role in reducing the unemployment rate among this group. The practical significance of the publication is to provide recommendations for the development of effective strategies for using AI in the process of immigrant integration.

Procedure Matters: The Distinct Attitudinal Feedback Effects of Immigration Policy

AbstractNatives who dislike immigrants prefer restrictive immigration policies, but do those policies deepen or alleviate anti-immigrant attitudes? Existing theories have offered mixed predictions. Restrictions imposed on immigrants may harden intergroup boundaries and thus deepen hostilities. However, they may also soften attitudes by addressing the economic and identity concerns of natives. Using a conjoint experiment conducted in Hong Kong, I test the multidimensional effects of immigration policies on natives’ attitudes toward highly skilled immigrants. I find that restrictive measures consistently generate more positive attitudes. Strikingly, this effect cannot be fully accounted for by major theoretical explanations, including labor market competition, social identity, and welfare attitudes. Preexisting policy preferences do not condition the effect either. These findings point to the importance of attitudinal policy feedback beyond traditional accounts of immigration attitudes. In-depth qualitative interviews identify two novel causal mechanisms: moralizing and quality assurance effects.

Dual Liminality Conditioned by Existing Citizenship: Highly Skilled Chinese Immigrants Navigating Legality and Career in the U.S.

Immigrants need to constantly manage their legal status while straddling uncertain life circumstances and shifting policies. U.S. immigrant policies treat immigrants based on U.S. internal and international political needs. This practice is only further heightened during a global crisis such as the recent COVID‐19 pandemic. Immigrants' existing citizenship contributes to the constraints they experience. Using Chinese international students studying in graduate programs as an example, this paper studies the dual liminality highly skilled immigrants experience in sustaining their legal status and developing their careers. Adopting a life course perspective, this paper reveals that liminal legality constrains immigrants' career choices as they transition from students to full‐time professionals. Acquiring legal status takes precedence over their career goals. They may forfeit career opportunities to secure legal status. Moreover, their Chinese citizenship hinders their career advancement. In recent years, United States–China rivalry in international politics and intellectual competition has intensified. Combined with a racialized construction of U.S. citizenship, highly skilled Chinese immigrants experience a heightened sense of vulnerability vis‐a‐vis institutional scrutiny and mistreatment.

Replication of “How much does immigration boost innovation?”

AbstractIdentifying the causal impact of immigration on outcomes commonly involves using a “shift‐share” or Bartik instrument, exploiting country‐specific immigration inflows (shifts) and location specific prior shares for the same countries. New findings suggest that identifying variation may come not from the shifts, as previously believed, but rather from the shares. In this paper, I first replicate Hunt and Gauthier‐Loiselle (HGL) who find skilled immigration increases innovation, and second employ new tests from the shift‐share literature. I find that the results of HGL replicate and hold up well to these new tests.

Online Employment Services for Immigrant Professionals: An Environmental Scan

This environmental scan assesses the current landscape of online employment services for immigrant professionals in Canada. The data collection method involved web scanning of twelve urban centers and two rural census areas with high per capita immigrant populations. The study analyzed 80 online services for immigrants in Canada based on geographical variation, the type of digital modality, clientele, and needs addressed. The findings reveal disparities in access to online employment programs tailored for skilled immigrants across different geographic locations. In addition, e-learning and self-paced online courses were identified as the most prevalent digital modalities. In terms of targeted clientele, findings show that the services primarily targeted immigrants as a homogenous group, with a notable emphasis on supporting skilled immigrants in high-demand fields such as IT and healthcare. Finally, access to job search resources emerged as the highest priority among the needs addressed, while areas such as financial assistance have the potential for further growth.

Skilled Immigration, R&D Concentration, and Industry Consolidation

Abstract We demonstrate a novel link between skilled immigration restrictions, corporate innovation, and industry consolidation. Binding restrictions on H1B visas are a shock to firms’ R&D labor supply, leading firms to shift R&D expenditures and employees overseas. Organizationally and financially constrained firms are less able to adjust to the restrictions. They reduce basic research and patenting, are less able to acquire other firms for intellectual property, and are more likely to exit. Industry concentration and firm-level markups increase when firms are better able to adjust. This increase in market power is an unintended consequence of skilled immigration restrictions.

Middle class by effort? Immigration, nation, and class from a transnational and intersectional perspective

ABSTRACT This article examines how highly skilled immigrants from Poland become middle-class in Germany through a transnational and intersectional lens. Hence, it asks what is the middle-class, and who and where belongs to it. First, it considers the fluidity of social class in post-socialist Poland to deconstruct middle-classness. Second, it draws on Reckwitz's distinction between the new and old middle classes in Germany and their factions to argue that immigrants cannot become middle class members by default. Based on the analysis of empirical material consisting of narrations of Polish immigrants, the article asks if Polish immigrants become middle class ‘by effort’. The analysis shows that Polish immigrants’ habitus locates them in-between different middle-class factions. The narrations suggest that these immigrants experience discrimination and exclusion, but – curiously – also demonstrate these immigrants’ lack of awareness of structural barriers in access to the middle-class factions in Germany. It argues that such ‘blindness’ to structural underpinnings of exclusion is a result of the entanglements of nationalism and neoliberalism, for example, the immigrants’ belief in meritocratic principles. Finally, the article suggests avenues for future theory-building by addressing the intersection of social class, gender, life course, and ethnicity to better understand middle-classness of immigrants.

Overcoming origin-based preferences by selecting skilled immigrants? Preferences in immigrants’ national origin and social class in Quebec

ABSTRACT Although most liberal democracies have abandoned preferences for national origins in immigrant selection policies, large segments of the local populations continue to prefer immigrants that they perceive to be of similar cultural, religious, and ethnic backgrounds as them. What remains unknown is whether governments can count on the promotion of successful economic integration to ensure acceptance of the greater ethnocultural and religious diversity of immigrants that now settles in host-countries through what has been identified as building a middle-class nation. Relying on an original survey experiment of 2400 respondents in Quebec, we compare reactions to immigrants of different professional status and two national origins (France and Algeria) to investigate if certain types of economic immigration can reduce origin-based preferences. Our results show that origin-based preferences shared by majority group members can be attenuated, but not eliminated by selection based on social class. That said, expectations that immigrants will contribute to Quebec's economy translate into greater acceptance of immigrants of all national origins and social classes.

Documented and Undocumented Skilled Mexican Immigrants and the Global Recession in Los Angeles Metropolitan Region

The main purpose of this article is to analyze the labor market integration of documented and undocumented skilled Mexican immigrants in Los Angeles Metropolitan region during the global recession of 2008. To this end, we use a mixed methodological approach. From the quantitative perspective, we analyze data from the American Community Survey. The qualitative approach includes 20 open-ended interviews with Mexican skilled immigrants. The main findings reveal that skilled immigrants were not negatively affected by the global recession. In addition, legal immigration status turned out to be the most important factor in differentiating those who obtained a skilled occupation and those who did not. However, some immigrants, including those who were undocumented, were able to strategically use their investment in human capital and their access to professional social networks in order to obtain professional occupations.

Migration and Innovation: How Foreign R&D Hires Shape Firm-Level Exploration in Their Host Country

Prior research ascribes an important role to highly skilled immigrants in the production and diffusion of knowledge. However, little is known about their contributions to shaping the type and direction of organizational innovation. We aim to shed light on this question by investigating how newly hired foreign research and development (R&D) workers affect firm-level exploration. We argue that foreign R&D hires enable firms to overcome local search by making them aware of and providing access to novel knowledge tied to their home countries. We test this using a sample of 376 Danish R&D-active firms over the period from 2001 to 2013. Our findings reveal that newly hired foreign R&D workers contribute significantly more to exploration than other types of R&D workers within the firm. Moreover, we find support for the proposed mechanism and show that knowledge from the home countries of foreign hires shapes firms’ inventive output. Our results further suggest that the effect of foreign R&D hires is stronger for firms with a limited international search orientation and those with an incumbent R&D workforce with a shorter organizational tenure. These findings offer insights into a potential mechanism through which foreign R&D workers can shape firm-level exploration and the organizational contingencies that influence this relationship. Funding: The authors got financial funding from the Novo Nordisk Foundation in the course of the project “Investments, incentives, and the impact of Danish research (Triple-I-Research)” [Grant NNF16OC0021444]. Supplemental Material: The online appendices are available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2021.16073 .

Skilled Immigrants, Firms, and the Global Geography of Innovation

This article begins with an overview of the policy environment in the United States and abroad for skilled immigration, with a particular focus on “supply-driven” versus “demand-driven” systems. The overview emphasizes that firms play a central role in the skilled immigration process in most countries. I then survey the ample evidence that skilled immigrants have a strong positive effect on firm outcomes, followed by a discussion of the many margins of adjustment that firms have when their access to skilled immigrants is affected by national immigration policy. Finally, given such margins of adjustment and the importance of skilled immigrants to firms, I consider how the policies that affect skilled migration shape the global geography and quality of innovation. I conclude by discussing policy implications and open questions. In particular, I emphasize that evaluations of the impact of skilled immigration should not be constrained within borders: immigration flows and national immigration policies affect the global geography of innovation and investment.

Challenges faced by Skilled Immigrants in Securing Suitable Employment in Canada: A Preliminary Qualitative Analysis

Challenges faced by Skilled Immigrants in Securing Suitable Employment in Canada: A Preliminary Qualitative Analysis